


Aftereffects

by pine_storm_season



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom
Genre: Flashbacks, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Trauma, lets hope the relationship tags sync up because i refuse to use the ones with tubbo skdjdhdhd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-20 14:54:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30006597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pine_storm_season/pseuds/pine_storm_season
Summary: tommy, understandably, is not doing well after he gets out of prison. ranboo and tubbo try to help, with varying degrees of success.
Relationships: Ranboo & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Ranboo & Tubbo, Tommyinnit & Tubbo
Comments: 5
Kudos: 306





	Aftereffects

**Author's Note:**

> speedrun time bitches (edit: finished editing this about twenty seconds after i got ranboo's stream notif and then ranboo streamed all the way up until i usually go to sleep skdjfkfjfhf)
> 
> warnings: trauma reactions, flashback, panic attack, mentioned dissociation, detailed description of tommy's death in prison, referenced abuse, also tommy refers to his own and others' trauma like,, really callously so there's that, and a lil bit of mild self-deprecation

Tommy had never really noticed his breathing. Well—technically that wasn't true, he supposed; high up on a tower, surrounded by stars, the air is cold and thin. In the nether, the air is hot and so dry it's hard to speak within minutes. When he's in small blackstone rooms, his breathing does something Tubbo calls _going into overdrive_. And yet—he’s never felt like it took conscious effort to breathe. Not like there was a weight on his chest, no, just…just that every breath took conscious thought on his part. Like as if when Dream brought him back, he brought him back _faulty._

That's how Tommy felt. He felt faulty. Like the earth had opened beneath his feet and let him crash through, but then brought him back up covered in blood and yet no one could see it. Like the very world around him was unstable.

Or maybe he was the unstable one. That's the word for when Wilbur went nuts, wasn’t it? When he started pacing and not sleeping and freaking out if anyone had even a second’s hesitation to listen. When he would wake—on the rare nights he slept—tense as a bowstring and wild-eyed.

Yeah, he was unstable. And maybe it was Dream’s fault, or Techno’s, or Wilbur’s, or Eret’s, but sometimes he couldn't help but be furious at himself for being so fucking _fragile_.

This was a good example, actually. He was sleeping in Tubbo’s house in Snowchester because he’d taken one step into the room, dark with night, and barely managed to stay on his feet. Well, _sleeping_ was a generous way of putting it. More like staring at the ceiling and trying—and failing—to not think.

He'd gotten so good at that in the prison, hadn't he? Dream would talk to him and Tommy would just let everything go far away and drifty and then more time would have passed than he expected when he came back.

But Snowchester was cold, and full of sounds and smells and textures, and every time he tried to go drifty something would pull him back.

This time it was Ranboo. _Ranboo_. Tommy tried not to hate Ranboo—he really did—but he hated him nonetheless. Ranboo had adopted a kid with Tubbo. Ranboo had made a hotel with Tubbo. Ranboo spent, according to Connor, every day with Tubbo.

And Ranboo was standing there, a few feet back from the couch Tommy was laying on, staring at him with an unreadable expression on his face.

“Fuck off,” Tommy muttered. “What’re you doin’ awake. ‘S the middle of the fuckin’ night.”

“Checking on Michael,” Ranboo said quietly. “I get anxious about him a lot.”

“Oh, right,” Tommy scoffed under his breath, sitting up. “The kid you adopted with my best friend.”

“Yes,” Ranboo said slowly. “He’s—” Something flickered across his face. “He’s my best friend, but I think you’re still his. If you're worried about that. There's no way he’d replace you with me. I'm not worth that.”

“Fuck off,” Tommy muttered again, “you don’t know anything.”

Ranboo tugged at his sleeves, swaying back and forth slightly, then seemed to make a decision.

“Can—can I come sit next to you?”

“No.”

Ranboo nodded and settled himself on the floor where he had been standing. Tommy just barely managed to keep his surprise from showing; he'd expected Ranboo to do it anyway, and laugh when he leaned away. But then again, this was Ranboo, not Dream, and as much as he hated the guy, Ranboo had always been nice to him.

“I want to say sorry,” Ranboo said, “for—for anything I did that hurt you. I don't know what I did, to—to cause you to treat me like this, but if I did anything that hurt you—I apologize.”

“Oh,” Tommy said, more than a little surprised. He’d thought that people wouldn’t bother to apologize to him. Only Dream—no, no, Dream didn't mean it. Dream didn't mean it. He'd been very determined to remember that in the cell. Dream never meant it.

“And—” Ranboo hesitated, and Tommy realized with slight surprise that his hands were shaking. “And I also have—experience with—with trauma regarding Dream. So. If you want to talk about that, I’ll be here to help.”

“Fuck off,” Tommy muttered again, but he couldn’t quite summon the venom he had before. He wanted to go to sleep. He wanted to go to sleep and not wake up frozen with panic.

“If you want,” Ranboo said softly, “I’ll treat you normally and stuff. Like—I tried to do that, earlier today, but I don't know if it helped.”

“I’d rather you treat me normal than some sort of fucking science experiment,” Tommy huffed. “Dream did, you know. He killed me and then left me there for _two months_ —or no, wait, he said it was only two days, but it was also two months—and then brought me back and just asked me questions, like, like, _oh, what was it like in the afterlife, what was it like being dead, tell me tell me tell me, hey look I’m Dream and I’m a fucking monster—”_

Somewhere between one word and the next, a tear came trailing down his face. Angrily, he wiped it away, growling under his breath.

Ranboo's hand drifted up and Tommy flinched, only for Ranboo to drop his hand back to his lap immediately. The dark side of his face was turned slightly toward the window, and moonlight made the tear scars silver.

“You know how I died, Ranboo?” he said suddenly. His voice was high and thin. “You know how I died?” And maybe it was the sleep deprivation, or the stress crash, or the fact that he'd started and now he couldn't stop, but suddenly he was spilling everything to someone he hated and the words were coming from deep inside him and not stopping.

“You know how I died? Dream beat me to death with a fucking potato. Well, only at the beginning, because he thought it was fucking funny, and then he switched to fucking hitting me, and kicking me, and then he started bashing my head into the floor—” Ranboo winced. “—and then I was just in a fucking black void, with Wilbur an’ Schlatt and—and I was there for nearly _two months_ Ranboo I was there for so long, and then he brought me back and everything was so fucking loud and hot and rough and he was asking me questions and then I finally got out and everyone was asking me questions and I couldn’t fucking stand it, you know that I can't stand to feel pain anymore? I tripped on my way here and had to talk myself down from a flashback or whatever the fuck it’s called, I dunno, and my head didn't stop being spinny for an hour or maybe two and the only reason I didn't just go drifty and stare into the distance like Dream always hated was because it was really cold and the cell was always so fucking hot—”

The words stopped when Tubbo appeared in the doorway, rubbing at his eyes with one hand but concern still clear on his face. Tommy was sitting there, frozen, his mouth still halfway through the formation of the next word, and suddenly the shame was so intense he would almost rather be back in the cell than here.

“Tubbo,” Tommy said, and his voice came out high and breathless and pitiful. “How—did—what did you hear.”

“Only the last little bit, big man,” Tubbo said, and Tommy was suddenly sure he was lying.

“Get the fuck away,” he spat, “get the fuck away from me—I don’t—I don’t—get away—”

Tubbo's face flickered from surprise, to shock, to hurt, to fear, and then abruptly he went blank and backed out of the room. Ranboo looked back and forth between them, and then he stood. Tommy flinched.

“I have to go check on him,” he said, apologetic, and darted out of the room.

All Tommy felt was rage. Tubbo was _his_ friend. Not Ranboo’s. If anyone, Tommy should be checking on him—Tommy should have known not to curse at him in the first place, not angrily— _you should have known better, Tommy, it's not my fault I have to do this—_

He gasped, sticking his hand into his mouth to muffle his cries, but the pain from biting down sent another wave of shock through him. He stumbled outside and collapsed into the snow, breathing hard like he’d run from spawn to the prison and back— _the prison—_

Tommy pressed the side of his face into the snow and tried to ground himself. Count, that's what Techno had told him to do, that one time they went into the sewers and stumbled into a blackstone room ringed with chests, but Tommy couldn't get his thoughts straight enough to count. He could feel phantom hands on his shoulders, shoving him down to the ground, a phantom hand in his hair, pulling his head back to smack it into the floor. He could feel the sharp stabbing pain of a broken rib, and he knew all his injuries had healed when Dream brought him back, knew he was in Snowchester, knew why every breath he took in stabbed his throat with the cold, but he couldn't fucking think past the panic, past the certainty he was going to die, again, again, he was going to die again and wake up in that obsidian hellhole and hear Dream’s voice in his ear and feel Dream’s hands on his shoulders, hear the smirk in his voice—

There was a low, rumbly voice, and Tommy jerked so hard he nearly got a mouthful of snow as he went to sit up.

Ranboo was crouched down a few feet away, talking quietly. It was mostly nonsense, a mixture of just his name and stupid, useless babbling like _you're okay_ and _deep breaths Tommy_ and _you’re safe_ , but all the same, Ranboo hadn't been in the prison. Ranboo hadn’t been in the cell, and so Tommy clung to that fact and tried to drag himself down from the panic attack, tried to slow his frantically pounding heart and the breaths that he couldn't make last longer than half a second.

He was getting dizzy, and he stuck his bare hands down into the snow to steady himself.

“You can hear me now, yeah?” Ranboo checked.

“B-b—bi-tch,” Tommy tried to spit, but it was just a word-shaped exhale and more pathetic than anything else.

“I—uh—okay,” Ranboo stammered, momentarily taken aback. “Um, breathing, right, let’s work on that. Uh—can you hold your breaths for maybe two seconds? Is that manageable?”

“F-ff-fuck off,” Tommy wheezed. “I d—don’t need your, _help,_ I don’—need it, don't need it, fuck of-ff-ff—”

“I know,” Ranboo said steadily, “but it sucks calming yourself down from a panic attack so I wanted to help.”

“Ffuck off,” Tommy said again, and Ranboo raised his hands placatingly.

“If I'm making it worse, I'll go,” he said. “Do you want me to go?”

 _Yes,_ Tommy wanted to say, but the word got stuck behind his teeth and he found himself shaking his head.

Nausea spun in his stomach, and he was even dizzier, so this time he did his best to listen when Ranboo counted to two— _two,_ how pathetic, Tommy couldn't hold his breath for two seconds—even though he hated accepting the help. He hated relying on people. They never held up their end of things, and then blamed him for it.

He hated it.

Eventually he managed to make it to a whole four seconds, and then coughs wracked his body and he went lightheaded again. His face was a mess of snot and tears and melted snow, but he was following Ranboo’s counting, and he no longer felt like he was going to die.

Score one for Tommyinnit, everyone. Not feeling in mortal peril in the middle of a snowy beach while his best friend’s husband— _husband—_ talked him down from a panic attack.

“Fuck you,” he said weakly, when he could speak again. His whole body shuddered, from fear and from cold, and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to go inside and curl up next to Tubbo and fall asleep listening to his friend’s heartbeat, like when Tubbo couldn't sleep for fear Schlatt would come yell at him, like when they both couldn't close their eyes without seeing a blackstone room with death waiting in the fucking walls.

Tommy struggled to his feet, nearly toppling over and only barely catching himself on the railing of the stairs, and shot Ranboo a glare for the aborted attempt at help. He didn't need help.

He made it inside, Ranboo following a few steps behind, and then turned and scowled at him. “Where’s Tubbo,” he said, too exhausted to make it sound like a question.

Ranboo led him a few rooms over, knocking on a door.

“Fuck off,” came a sleepy voice, and Tommy’s heart ached at the realization that Tubbo was right there.

“Tommy wants to see you,” Ranboo said, and opened the door to let Tommy inside.

Tommy stumbled across the room, and Tubbo sat up, slowly growing more alert. “Hey, Tommy,” he said softly, like everything was normal, like back before everything—before exile— _before L’manburg—_

Tommy sobbed and collapsed into Tubbo’s arms. Dully, he registered that Tubbo was talking softly, and stroking his hair, and holding onto him, but Tommy just buried his face in the front of Tubbo's shoulder and cried.

When he stopped, neither of them even had to talk. It was just like old times, just like before everything, when one of them would come to the other because of a totally normal, trauma-unrelated nightmare, and the other would hold them and let them fall asleep with their head against their heart.

And apparently he was more exhausted than he’d thought, because it was only moments before he stopped thinking at all.


End file.
